Serral @ WCS Fall: "...if Zerg plays perfect, then Zerg sh…

There is not much surprise in Serral acknowledging that lategame ZvT is imbalanced. Many Zerg progamers have been doing so for months, as has the bulk of people in the community in general. But I guess Serral is saying that even after the new patch it hasn't changed all that much, although Zerg now need to be more careful with their Infestors because they can be heavily punished by a single mistake.

On the other hand, reading these mental gymnastics that some people go through in this thread to attempt to make Serral say something he doesn't do at all is... something.

End Region Lock, not WCS | "I saw what sneakyfox wrote on TL.net and it made me furious" - PartinG

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be...unless you're gonna try to make early-mid-game equal as well, which is impossible. Perfect balance in all stages of the game for all non-mirror MUs is never gonna happen. Trying to attempt the impossible will likely only introduce more problems than solutions.

Sure, but that means we need some maps that allow T and P to play to their strengths, not just giant maps that allow Zerg to get to lategame without much issue.

On September 10 2019 11:22 pzlama333 wrote:Does he mean that even the Terran player play perfect, the Zerg still should always win a late ZvT if the Zerg also play perfect. That does not sound good in theory. However, in a real game, players from both side will make mistakes eventually some time. I would like to know how is the fault-tolerance of any race. If one player makes one small mistake, does it cost the whole game, a single fight, or easy to recover?

Well I disagree to be honest, you can't expect to have every steps of the game to be balanced. I'm not even sure it would make the game more interesting even if it was possible. Problems is that as time goes by, and Zerg learn how to defend all early/mid games agressions, and with the creep mechanics and how good are Zerg to spread it it is now too easy to get there which is the bigger problem.

When Stephano was at his prime and the "only" good foreigner Zerg, it was before the Queen buff. He already figured it out how broken Infestor/BL was and was aiming to this composition, but he was the only foreigner able to get there with a good enough economy as it was very hard to survive early/midgame TvZ at the time. While "necessary" (debatable I know) the Queen buff made it way too easy and hence was the patch-Zerg era and everyone was able to survive until late-game easily.

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be.

how about no?

all races should have equal chances at all points in the game ideally

pretty much impossible. you can't have asymmetric race matchups without power spikes existing. balance means keeping any one power spike from being so oppressive (or necessary) that all strategies converge solely on attaining it (which BL/infestor was arguably pretty close to prepatch).

the statement that "zerg deserves an advantage lategame" is pretty arguable/controversial, but i see the idea behind it: zerg's advantages will always come from overdroning and larger economy, T and P will always rely on timings and harass to reduce droning, therefore a zerg that survives should theoretically become stronger. it's debatable and not an exact science but it's not totally illogical

but there are a lot of factors and a lot of moving pieces to balance. part of the problem is that the pro meta is very single-minded in the players' dedication to the strongest winning strategies, so there's rarely a picture of the strength of "alternative" strategies. a lot of viewers simply assume all alternative strategies are horrific and bronzey, but that's not the case - sometimes alternatives are terrible, but sometimes they're just marginally less efficient. so when you soften BL/infestor part of the question becomes "where does the matchup end up if zergs don't want to be in the lategame anymore?" how strong is zerg if terran is trying to get to mass BC, mass thor, etc, and zerg is doing nothing but timings?

i'm not supporting any race here, and my instinct is that BL/infestor was or is slightly too strong, but singular nerfs don't always solve problems. sometimes solving one balance issue creates two new ones, which is why players often end up frustrated with inaction. i don't care for BW and i'm not one to normally invoke their community, but BW players by virtue of their older and less dynamic game are much more comfortable with the idea of not receiving constant balance tweaks, and sometimes i wish we had that in SC2 instead of a bunch of screaming forever diamonds who think their ladder losses have something to do with pro games

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be.

how about no?

all races should have equal chances at all points in the game ideally

pretty much impossible. you can't have asymmetric race matchups without power spikes existing. balance means keeping any one power spike from being so oppressive (or necessary) that all strategies converge solely on attaining it (which BL/infestor was arguably pretty close to prepatch).

the statement that "zerg deserves an advantage lategame" is pretty arguable/controversial, but i see the idea behind it: zerg's advantages will always come from overdroning and larger economy, T and P will always rely on timings and harass to reduce droning, therefore a zerg that survives should theoretically become stronger. it's debatable and not an exact science but it's not totally illogical

but there are a lot of factors and a lot of moving pieces to balance. part of the problem is that the pro meta is very single-minded in the players' dedication to the strongest winning strategies, so there's rarely a picture of the strength of "alternative" strategies. a lot of viewers simply assume all alternative strategies are horrific and bronzey, but that's not the case - sometimes alternatives are terrible, but sometimes they're just marginally less efficient. so when you soften BL/infestor part of the question becomes "where does the matchup end up if zergs don't want to be in the lategame anymore?" how strong is zerg if terran is trying to get to mass BC, mass thor, etc, and zerg is doing nothing but timings?

i'm not supporting any race here, and my instinct is that BL/infestor was or is slightly too strong, but singular nerfs don't always solve problems. sometimes solving one balance issue creates two new ones, which is why players often end up frustrated with inaction. i don't care for BW and i'm not one to normally invoke their community, but BW players by virtue of their older and less dynamic game are much more comfortable with the idea of not receiving constant balance tweaks, and sometimes i wish we had that in SC2 instead of a bunch of screaming forever diamonds who think their ladder losses have something to do with pro games

i didnt say it was possible. i said it was ideal

the game can be design to be as close to ideal as possible, rather than purposely designed in a way that races have significant advantages at certain stages

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be.

all races should have equal chances at all points in the game ideally

I don't mind that that's your personal preference, but are you suggesting that zerg doesn't have an early-mid game disadvantage? I believe the consensus is that it does. If you make lategame perfectly balanced without balancing the early and midgame, then that means zerg would be become the disadvantaged race.

On September 10 2019 11:22 pzlama333 wrote:Does he mean that even the Terran player play perfect, the Zerg still should always win a late ZvT if the Zerg also play perfect. That does not sound good in theory. However, in a real game, players from both side will make mistakes eventually some time. I would like to know how is the fault-tolerance of any race. If one player makes one small mistake, does it cost the whole game, a single fight, or easy to recover?

I'm not sure ... but a common say in Wings of Liberty was that "if the terran plays perfect the terran will/should always win".(No idea who coined it or where it came from but I feel it popped up fairly often.)It could of course be totally unrelated ...

I fully understand that Serral does not want to list his practice partners. They must be enough and eventually you can forget someone who may feel upset about not being mentioned. It's hard not to leave someone and then it tastes really bad. Serral is getting smarter.

BL should be reworked. It's incredibly coin flippy unit. It can destroy your opponent but also get easily caught of position cos it's the slowest in the game, it can also get blindsided since it is only top tier unit w/o AA (unlike Carrier, Tempest and BC). I don't really find it fun to play with or against. It sucks, that sometimes I need to make it, because breaking entrenched positions is super hard (Infestor + Viper can do it, but that is uncontrollable below Master).

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be.

all races should have equal chances at all points in the game ideally

I don't mind that that's your personal preference, but are you suggesting that zerg doesn't have an early-mid game disadvantage? I believe the consensus is that it does. If you make lategame perfectly balanced without balancing the early and midgame, then that means zerg would be become the disadvantaged race.

I don't really think Z really has an early-mid game disadvantage. Sure that might've been the case in earlier versions of SC2 but right now with how queens are, their defense is super solid.

Also what I think most people are missing here is the main reason Z is so strong late game imo is not BL/Infestor but the fact that they can bank multiple remaxes in larva. BL/Infestor is very strong but it can be traded vs. Being able to trade out max armies and remax instantly on BL/Infestor again or some other tech makes it super tough to face. Looks like Dark TY was very competitive going to have a look.

On September 10 2019 16:55 midhigh wrote:I am not saying i could do it, but for me it is really suprising no terran player basically has ever tried to flank with ghosts. They usually send their ghost's to nuke, while they could try to flank with a group of ghosts from many angles to EMP Infestors, and actually try to kill the Zerg army, or weaken enough to win later. We have seen many games and fights won by Zergs (mostly Serral), against superior army with good ling/roach/etc flanks.

One of the best and most recent examples:

I know, it is kind of risky, but when you are already behind (because Zerg late game is OP theorically), you must try to do something unexpected.

In general, Terrans never adapt/evolve their playstyle compare to toss and zergs.

Terrans were always praised for their bio splits against banes or HT for years. However, today splitting is a basic skill that all 3 races have in their skillset

Toss and Zergs learned how to use their spellcaster more effectively, e.g warp prism HT. Both toss and zergs know how to flank with their spellcasters at different locations/angles

Been almost a decade and terran still use ghost the same way. Ghost will ALWAYS bunched with the bio and come in the front (one direction). You will never see them use ghost and flank from behind or even hide them in medivac.

Terran engagements has always been the same with very minor changes through the years. Frontal engagement and hopefully break enemy with brutal bio DPS

On September 10 2019 23:43 DomeGetta wrote:Also what I think most people are missing here is the main reason Z is so strong late game imo is not BL/Infestor but the fact that they can bank multiple remaxes in larva. BL/Infestor is very strong but it can be traded vs. Being able to trade out max armies and remax instantly on BL/Infestor again or some other tech makes it super tough to face. Looks like Dark TY was very competitive going to have a look.

Remaxing quickly isn't too relevant in the lategame when you need to morph corruptors first before morphing into BL, and infestors require a good amount of time to accumulate energy, unless you're talking about maxing out with purely tier 1-2 units, which no pro does lategame.

On September 10 2019 17:27 tigon_ridge wrote:Lategame zerg deserves to have an advantage over T and P. Stop trying to make it equal. It shouldn't be.

all races should have equal chances at all points in the game ideally

I don't mind that that's your personal preference, but are you suggesting that zerg doesn't have an early-mid game disadvantage? I believe the consensus is that it does. If you make lategame perfectly balanced without balancing the early and midgame, then that means zerg would be become the disadvantaged race.

I agree that Zerg has a weak early and mid game. Been saying that for months ever since creep and queen nerf. Although that disadvantage might be gone in ZvP thanks to prism warp and overlord speed buff. All I’m saying is what the goal should be.

On September 10 2019 16:55 midhigh wrote:I am not saying i could do it, but for me it is really suprising no terran player basically has ever tried to flank with ghosts. They usually send their ghost's to nuke, while they could try to flank with a group of ghosts from many angles to EMP Infestors, and actually try to kill the Zerg army, or weaken enough to win later. We have seen many games and fights won by Zergs (mostly Serral), against superior army with good ling/roach/etc flanks.

I know, it is kind of risky, but when you are already behind (because Zerg late game is OP theorically), you must try to do something unexpected.

In general, Terrans never adapt/evolve their playstyle compare to toss and zergs.

Terrans were always praised for their bio splits against banes or HT for years. However, today splitting is a basic skill that all 3 races have in their skillset

Toss and Zergs learned how to use their spellcaster more effectively, e.g warp prism HT. Both toss and zergs know how to flank with their spellcasters at different locations/angles

Been almost a decade and terran still use ghost the same way. Ghost will ALWAYS bunched with the bio and come in the front (one direction). You will never see them use ghost and flank from behind or even hide them in medivac.

Terran engagements has always been the same with very minor changes through the years. Frontal engagement and hopefully break enemy with brutal bio DPS

Is this a troll account? HAve you like ever seen the top Maru's games? The ones where the spectator has issues of following the fight on the maximum zoom-out while Maru engages from 3 different angles, simultaneously? IN HOTS? Where have you been when mulitple shifts in T play happened? It may surprise you but T play evolved. If nothing else - the damn Raven play?

Like, seriously?

I imagine France should be able to take this unless Lilbow is busy practicing for Starcraft III. | KadaverBB is my fairy ban mother.

On September 10 2019 16:55 midhigh wrote:I am not saying i could do it, but for me it is really suprising no terran player basically has ever tried to flank with ghosts. They usually send their ghost's to nuke, while they could try to flank with a group of ghosts from many angles to EMP Infestors, and actually try to kill the Zerg army, or weaken enough to win later. We have seen many games and fights won by Zergs (mostly Serral), against superior army with good ling/roach/etc flanks.

I know, it is kind of risky, but when you are already behind (because Zerg late game is OP theorically), you must try to do something unexpected.

In general, Terrans never adapt/evolve their playstyle compare to toss and zergs.

Terrans were always praised for their bio splits against banes or HT for years. However, today splitting is a basic skill that all 3 races have in their skillset

Toss and Zergs learned how to use their spellcaster more effectively, e.g warp prism HT. Both toss and zergs know how to flank with their spellcasters at different locations/angles

Been almost a decade and terran still use ghost the same way. Ghost will ALWAYS bunched with the bio and come in the front (one direction). You will never see them use ghost and flank from behind or even hide them in medivac.

Terran engagements has always been the same with very minor changes through the years. Frontal engagement and hopefully break enemy with brutal bio DPS

Is this a troll account? HAve you like ever seen the top Maru's games? The ones where the spectator has issues of following the fight on the maximum zoom-out while Maru engages from 3 different angles, simultaneously? IN HOTS? Where have you been when mulitple shifts in T play happened? It may surprise you but T play evolved. If nothing else - the damn Raven play?

Like, seriously?

Lol seriously?

You are praising Maru engage from 3 different angles? Everyone know you are a terran fan boy here but you need to take off your bias glasses

Zerg/Toss engages at 3 different angles simultaneously all the time in every single game. So when a terran does it, all a sudden it's amazing?

On September 10 2019 16:55 midhigh wrote:I am not saying i could do it, but for me it is really suprising no terran player basically has ever tried to flank with ghosts. They usually send their ghost's to nuke, while they could try to flank with a group of ghosts from many angles to EMP Infestors, and actually try to kill the Zerg army, or weaken enough to win later. We have seen many games and fights won by Zergs (mostly Serral), against superior army with good ling/roach/etc flanks.

I know, it is kind of risky, but when you are already behind (because Zerg late game is OP theorically), you must try to do something unexpected.

In general, Terrans never adapt/evolve their playstyle compare to toss and zergs.

Terrans were always praised for their bio splits against banes or HT for years. However, today splitting is a basic skill that all 3 races have in their skillset

Toss and Zergs learned how to use their spellcaster more effectively, e.g warp prism HT. Both toss and zergs know how to flank with their spellcasters at different locations/angles

Been almost a decade and terran still use ghost the same way. Ghost will ALWAYS bunched with the bio and come in the front (one direction). You will never see them use ghost and flank from behind or even hide them in medivac.

Terran engagements has always been the same with very minor changes through the years. Frontal engagement and hopefully break enemy with brutal bio DPS

Is this a troll account? HAve you like ever seen the top Maru's games? The ones where the spectator has issues of following the fight on the maximum zoom-out while Maru engages from 3 different angles, simultaneously? IN HOTS? Where have you been when mulitple shifts in T play happened? It may surprise you but T play evolved. If nothing else - the damn Raven play?

Like, seriously?

Lol seriously?

You are praising Maru engage from 3 different angles? Everyone know you are a terran fan boy here but you need to take off your bias glasses

Zerg/Toss engages at 3 different angles simultaneously all the time in every single game. So when a terran does it, all a sudden it's amazing?

Did you ever think that it's a bit easier to attack from 3 different angles with zerg/toss than terran because of how the units are? :DD Have you ever played terran before?